Fire breaks out at Romania's biggest oil refinery

A fire at Romania's Black Sea crude oil refinery Petromidia, the largest in the country, was being brought under control after a blaze broke out on Wednesday, a government emergency response unit said, as per Hydrocarbonprocessing.

An Environment Ministry unit reported the fire occurred after an explosion at the refinery, located in Constanta county, halfway up Romania's coast and 240 km (149 miles) east of the capital Bucharest. Refinery representatives could not be immediately contacted.

No victims from the blaze were reported, and the emergency response unit said no dangerous substances were detected in the air. Television footage had earlier shown black smoke rising from the area next to the refinery. "At the moment the fire is no longer aflame," an emergency response spokesperson said.

"Because there is a risk it will be re-ignited, technical staff (of the company) are emptying out the installation and firefighters are continuing with cooling measures." The refinery is owned by Rompetrol Rafinare, which is majority controlled by KMG International (KMGI), part of Kazakh state oil firm KazMunayGaz. The Romanian state holds a 45% stake.

The refinery sources crude oil from Kazakhstan. In 2022, it processed 5.26 million tons of raw materials, according to its website, with 63% of the 4.1 million tons of fuels it produced - including gasoline, diesel and aviation fuel - directed to the domestic market.

We remind, Axens has signed an agreement with KazMunayGas (KMG) to supply the process design package for its proprietary AlphaButol technology for producing high-purity 1-butene, which is required for producing PE. KMG has plans for a 1.2 million t/y PE plant in Atyrau, Kazakhstan. French technology and engineering group Axens has signed an agreement with KazMunayGas (KMG) to supply the process design package for its proprietary AlphaButol technology that produces high-purity 1-butene, which is required for producing PE. KMG plans to build a 1.2 million t/y PE plant in the Atyrau region of Kazakhstan – a timescale for the project has not been disclosed.

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Two crude cargoes loaded from China's Penglai oilfields arrived at Singapore and Malaysia in May and June, Refinitiv data showed, an unusual export from the world's largest crude importer, said Hydrocarbonprocessing.

Aframax-sized tanker Elephant loaded about 48,000 metric tons of Penglai crude from the field in Bohai Bay at the end of May and arrived at Singapore in mid-June, the data showed. Earlier, 80,000 tons of Penglai crude was loaded on Aframax vessel Yang Ning Hu in April and arrived at Malaysia in May.

Penglai crude was last exported in March 2022, Refinitiv data showed. The cargoes were likely headed to Singapore and Malaysia to be blended with other oils to create low-sulphur fuel oil for ships, trade sources said.

Penglai crude is a low-sulphur heavy crude similar to Australian Vincent crude, which is also used in fuel oil blending. The Penglai oilfields are a group of offshore oil fields operated by the China National Offshore Oil Corp (CNOOC) in the Bohai Bay in northeast China.

CNOOC holds a 51% interest in Penglai, while the remainder is held by subsidiaries of ConocoPhillips.

We remind, Nigeria's state-owned oil company NNPC Ltd said on Thursday it had renewed a production sharing contract with Total, China National Offshore Oil Corp and others, a major step to resolving disputes on a deepwater oil block in the Niger Delta. Oil Mining Lease 130 is located offshore Niger Delta at water depths of over 1000 meters. The block contains the producing Akpo and Egina fields and the Preowei discovery.

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Thyssenkrupp Uhde and Johnson Matthey (JM) have installed a new process to increase ammonia production capacity at Koch Fertilizer's facility in Fort Dodge, IA, US, as per Petrochemical-news.

During a USD140 M revamp of the plant, Thyssenkrupp Uhde and JM installed a combination of Uhde dual-pressure process for ammonia production, which was installed upstream of the existing ammonia synthesis loop, and Katalco 74-1 catalyst from JM.

The project is expected to increase ammonia production capacity at the facility by 85,000 tonnes/y.

We remind, Honeywell announced that SASA Polyester Sanayi A.S. will build the world’s largest Propane Dehydrogenation (PDH) unit in Yumurtal'k, Turkiye using the latest generation of Honeywell Oleflex technology. The facility will have the capacity to produce 1 million tons of propylene per year. The Honeywell UOP Oleflex process is used to produce light olefins through the catalytic dehydrogenation of light paraffin and provides users with an on-purpose source of polymer grade propylene and/or isobutylene.

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China’s Satellite Chemical is planning to invest yuan (CNY) 25.7bn (USD3.6bn) to construct an alpha-olefin industry park in Lianyungang of Jiangsu province, the company announced.

The complex will mainly consist of a 2.5m tonne/year α-olefin feedstock facility, five α-olefin units each with 100,000 tonnes/year of capacity, three polyolefin elastomer (POE) units each at 200,000 tonne/year capacity, two metallocene polyethylene (PE) units each at 500,000 tonne/year capacity, two polyvinyl chloride (PVC) units with 400,000 tonne/year capacity each, a 15,000 tonne/year poly α-olefin and a 50,000 tonne/year ultra high molecular weight PE (UHMWPE) unit, among others.

Constructions are expected to begin before the end of 2024.

We remind, Satellite Chemical has achieved on-spec products from its second ethane cracker and derivatives units at Lianyungang in Jiangsu province on 27 August 2022. Major facilities include a 1.25m tonnes/year cracker, a 400,000 tonnes/year polyethylene (PE), a 730,000 tonnes/year ethylene oxide (EO) and a 600,000 tonnes/year styrene plants. They form part 2 of its first phase C2 project at the site. The company realised mechanical completion of those facilities in early June.

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Covestro has commenced a new manufacturing line for thermoplastic polyurethanes (TPUs) that will be utilized for paint protection films (PPFs), said the company.

The line is installed at the firm's current Taiwanese facility in Changhua. Products manufactured here will be available in the global market. The world's PPF market is expected to rise steadily until 2030, with Asia-Pacific representing the biggest share of the overall market.

Growth forecast in the region is fuelled by that of the Chinese market. Europe and North America are also exhibiting solid increase. The PPFs will be marketed under the Desmopan UP brand. The new manufacturing line and the introduction of Desmopan UP will help meet rising demand for high-performance PPF in the Asia-Pacific region and around the globe.

We remind, Covestro, a leading manufacturer of high-quality polymer materials and their components, has signed a 90 megawatt (MW) virtual power purchase agreement (vPPA) with Orsted, a clean energy leader in the U.S. market, headquartered in Denmark.

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